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ABSTRACT

Contemporary distance higher education is hinged on modern technologies to deliver purely online and blended modes of learning mostly through learning management system (LMS). This is to bridge the transactional gap between students and instructors as well as among students themselves. However, the use of technologies such as LMS for dispensing distance tertiary education is at a cross-road of mandatoriness or voluntariness of use. Nonetheless, current literature supports the voluntary use of LMS by instructors in order to foster positive attitudes and personalization among instructors. Based on this, there is the need to unravel the determining facts that promote voluntary usage of LMS among tutors.
This study thus, employs a quantitative approach based on a survey design to purposively collect data from 267 tutors in a blended distance education setting using a questionnaire. Generalized structural component analysis technique was adopted for structural equation modelling. Results from a structural equation modelling revealed that performance expectancy, effort expectancy, facilitating conditions, and social influence, all determine tutors’ voluntariness of use of LMS for blended learning in distance education. Additionally, voluntariness of use predicted actual LMS use behavior among tutors. On the basis of the results, recommendations were made to reflect theory, policy and practice of voluntary integration of LMS by tutors for blended learning in distance education.

Keywords: LMS, voluntariness of use, tutors, blended learning, distance higher education, generalized structural component analysis